ELT Concept #13 – Formative Assessment
Phuong Cao – 8 July 2021
What is it?
The last several decades have seen a growing interest in formative assessment. While summative assessment continues to play a role, formative assessment, also known as assessment for learning, is gaining popularity. If we look at formative assessment from a classroom perspective, it can be interpreted as part of everyday practice done by teachers, students and peers for the sake of enhancing teaching and learning.
In that practice, the three parties seek, reflect upon and respond to the information collected via numerous formative assessment procedures (e.g., portfolio, journals, observations). Teachers and students make use of that information to inform further teaching and learning. Indeed, research has shown that formative assessment can substantially improve teaching and learning if it is done properly (Gu, 2021). Let’s look at one of the most influential definitions of formative assessment.
“Practice in a classroom is formative to the extent that evidence about student achievement is elicited, interpreted, and used by teachers, learners, of their peers, to make decisions about the next steps in instruction that are likely to be better, or better founded, than the decisions they would have taken in the absence of the evidence that was elicited (Black & Wiliam, 2009, p. 9)
Why is it important?
Recently, formative assessment has received a renewed interest from classroom teachers for its numerous benefits. There is an increasing number of voices saying that formative assessment can improve student learning. Many studies in EFL contexts found positive results in learners’ linguistic improvement in all four skills when their teachers implement formative assessment strategies. For example, In the Japanese context, Ross (2005) found that teachers’ formative assessment practices are more effective in promoting student improvement in listening proficiency than traditional summative assessments.
The impacts of formative assessment have been shown in many studies conducted by classroom teachers on students’ non-linguistic achievement, such as their self-regulated learning and motivation. Some teachers found that their feedback could benefit learners’ motivation and learning achievement depending on how learners may take it. Students could also improve their self-regulated learning ability through the use of formative feedback and made progress in setting their learning goals and self-evaluating their performance against their goals.
My Reflection
My initial interest in employing formative assessment in my teaching practices was when I was pursuing my first M.A in TEFL with a Vietnamese institution. At that time, I attended a professional development course in Australia in 2011. I got to understand the beneficial effects of formative assessment through a workshop given by Southern Cross University. It was also the first time in my career path that I could get access to the world-standard digital library that allowed me to access journal articles about formative assessment. Through these vigorous activities, I became extremely fascinated by how formative assessment could close students’ learning gaps to their desired goals. As a result, I had conducted action research using formative assessment methods in my classrooms.
Engaging in formative assessment classroom activities since then, I have grown myself as a formative assessment practitioner with a sustained commitment. After I completed my second M.A with Victoria University of Wellington in 2017, I decided to further my research in formative assessment to fulfil my burning desire. To this end, I am doing a PhD project of formative assessment in EFL context to explore the relationship between teachers’ assessment practices and students’ learning gains.
References:
Black, P., & Wiliam, D. (2009). Developing the theory of formative assessment. Educational Assessment, Evaluation and Accountability, 21(1), 5–31.
Gu, P. Y. (2021). Classroom-based formative assessment. Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press. Beijing, China.
Ross, S. J. (2005). The Impact of Assessment Method on Foreign Language Proficiency Growth. Applied Linguistics, 26(3), 317–342.
ELT Concept #12: Peace (Applied) Linguistics
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